


48Hours

by janetthetrigger



Category: 15th Century CE RPF, The Sunne in Splendour - Sharon Kay Penman, The White Queen (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Fluff, Horror Film Festival, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-07
Updated: 2014-10-07
Packaged: 2018-02-20 06:13:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2418005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janetthetrigger/pseuds/janetthetrigger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They have 48 hours to make a horror film, Anne is called in last minute to help.</p>
            </blockquote>





	48Hours

**Author's Note:**

> All the characters correspond to real people, the story parallels somewhere around the Battle of Barnet. I might add more, I love the idea of following the two of them for the weekend.
> 
> Note: Inspired by my own weekend adventure. Basically didn’t sleep all weekend but I really wanted to write something so if something looks completely messed up let me know. This will get edited again when I am more awake.

“Anne?” She glanced as far back as she could without interrupting the make-up artist in front of her, he sounded pleasantly surprised. Richard stood before the door to the gallery of their temporary green room, profiled from her vantage point. Wrinkled, the sleeves of his button down shirt were rolled up to his elbows and the dark circles of his eyes even more prominent in the glare from the window. The pencil he had been unconsciously chewing on paused between his fingers, waited as he assessed. 

A breath of fresh air she hadn’t realized she needed, long overdue.

“Did your brothers rope you into this?” She asked.

“Is that even a real question? I was signed on from the beginning. The real question is how you got roped into this.” Upon entering the room, he leaned against the table of makeup supplies and pointed with his utensil at the prosthetics they had begun applying to her neck, “Woah. That looks sick.”

His sister Meg frowned, wiped a bit of spirit glue on a paper towel, “I’m hoping they’ll be finished setting up for her scene when we’re finished.”

To Anne, he asked “But what happened?”

“Beaufort quit while you were at lunch.” Meg answered for her. 

“Isabel called me in a panic because George was threatening to make her do the part and she is terrified of horror movies.”

“Now he’s trapped you here.”

“And I’m being lathered in sticky substances.”

His mouth closed suddenly against the innuendo, a smile held down under his teeth. 

“Oh my gosh,” Meg laughed hard enough that she had to lean back, hand shaking too much to continue. Wiped at her eye, careful not to get any of the product on her face.

One of Richard’s hands tugged through his hair, head shook while he fought against the smile. The triumph was palpable, she felt as if she could hear his heart. Unguarded.

He looked vulnerable. 

“Have you been here since last night?” 

He crossed his arms, rubbed at tired eyes with a hand, “Yeah, since they drew the genre. I was writing until 5am this morning.”

“Shouldn’t you be done now then?”

“Ed wanted to direct the camera and George thinks he’s helping direct the camera, someone needed to produce and coach the actors.”

“You’re producing and coaching and you wrote it?” Anne flinched as Meg poked at her neck, tried to keep the grimace from her face. 

“Frank Lovell and I are sharing producer role.” 

“Frank? I haven’t seen him since elementary school. You guys have been friends forever!”

“Yeah, we stick together.”

“Eddy asked me to be in his film first. I was over there this morning.”

Total nonchalance, Richard fingered a bottle of stage blood. For some reason the sight of his disguised interest sat against her teeth, threatened to emerge as longing. “But you’re here now?”

“But I’m here now.”

He glanced up at her, read something in her noncommittal answer, she had not anticipated how easy it was to talk to him even after all the years. They’d spent so much time in the same circles but not directly interacting, it would not have surprised her to know that he was conscious of most of her whereabouts. 

In any case, Isabel had kept her informed about what he’d been doing. He’d figured out how to do exactly what he had always wanted, writing.

“Eddy’s an ass, you never should have been on his team.”

“It was Marge’s team, she kicked me out. Told me I was bothering her for some reason or other. So I jumped ship.”

“Probably not before Eddy screamed and threw some crap.”

Against Anne’s wishes, Meg said, “I had to cover up a bruise.”

An excuse was quick to come to mind but the unreadable darkness that passed across Richard’s eyes stopped her, deep and challenging. It was impossible to say anything but the truth under his probing observation but Anne could barely tell herself the truth let alone admit it aloud.

The question sat, unasked. Everyone knew she had been dating Eddy. Everyone knew Eddy was violent. Anne never thought anyone would be as blunt as Richard and she could tell that he was surreptitiously gauging her reaction. 

Meg moved on to the dark layers for the inside of the latex cut, stabbing with the brush as Anne stared over her head to avoid eye contact.

With cautious ease, the moment passed and Anne felt that she could breathe once again. Meg seemed willing to put it aside and Richard seemed to have learned all Anne could answer without speaking. 

“You went to school with Eddy and Marge, right?”

“My dad would only pay if I went to Lancaster, it kind of sucked, but I’ve got a degree and that’s been doing me some good.”

“I wish you had gone to York.”

His eyes were openly engaging, a sort of apology, Anne felt the heat in her cheeks. The outlandish reaction from such a simple statement was unexpected. She could see a corner of Meg’s lip curve as she tried to seem unaffected. 

Her and Richard had ended up best friends the summer before he went to college, spent every day hanging out. No way would she admit the crush she harbored for years even before that, but the way he stared at her now…

Was he just being nice?

“That is coming along fantastically, Meg!” Richard’s brother Ed interrupted suddenly, all smiles and high energy, “You look so freaky.”

“If you’re done flirting with Anne, we’re ready to do some blocking in the basement.” Behind Ed was the sullen George, Meg had dished to Anne that George nearly switched teams earlier and was still grumpy about some creative decision he hadn’t been allowed to make. 

“Hey,” Richard scoffed, “I was waiting on you dorks.”

“Thanks for helping, Anne,” Ed laughed outright, “I heard Marge hasn’t even finished one scene yet.”

“Glad I’m not over there anymore.” 

“We’re doing Anne’s death scene next, right?” 

“I don’t know, Richard, you put the schedule together. Shouldn’t you know? Or are you distracted or something?”

“Butt.” He retorted, everyone laughed and they were talking through shots as they exited. Anne realized that his pencil sat in her lap. She didn’t know if she had picked it up or if it had dropped from his hands but it was still warm, the wood worn and mangled from his habitual gnawing. Kind of gross. Against her better judgment, she spent the rest of her make up session turning it over in her fingers.

It felt like a good luck charm.


End file.
